


The Place Where They Have to Take You In

by igrockspock



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Found Family, Friendship, Gen, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-09
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-07-14 03:01:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7150406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrockspock/pseuds/igrockspock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laura Barton has a penchant for adopting all sorts of unlikely creatures.  Baby birds with broken wings.  Sharpshooting secret agents who used to be in the circus.  Genius playboy billionaire philanthropists who just really, really need a good friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Place Where They Have to Take You In

Laura Barton calls Tony Stark every afternoon at 2:30 for two reasons: one, worrying about people is in her nature, and two, she’s getting pretty fucking starved for adult conversations that don’t involve lying about her husband’s unexpected incarceration. Unlike the other Avengers, Tony is neither in jail nor attempting to rescue others from jail, so he’s available.

“Are you brooding?” she asks. “I think you’re brooding.”

“Wrong superhero,” Tony says. “I’m not the brooder. Try Cap. Or Banner. Oh, wait, you can’t. They’re gone.”

“Mmm, right, you’re definitely not brooding,” she says. There’s a whooping noise in the background that sounds suspiciously like a fire alarm, followed by some muffled swearing. “Are you alright?” she asks.

“Alright in what sense?” he shoots back.

Laura sighs. She doesn’t know Tony particularly well, but if he’s admitting to unhappiness -- even indirectly -- she thinks he might start some kind of apocalypse through technology. “Come to dinner. Please,” she says.

“You keep asking that. Why do you keep asking that?” Tony sounds genuinely baffled, which kind of makes her heart ache. Damn maternal instinct.

“In some circles, continuously asking someone to dinner is a sign that you want them to come to dinner,” she says. “I’ll roast a chicken. Free range. Organic. Killed it myself this morning.”

“Alright, I’ll bite,” Tony says. “But only because the whole chicken killing thing is mildly disturbing. What should I bring?”

“A salad,” Laura says. 

“A salad?” Tony asks. “That’s all? Because I could go down to the wine cellar, or the robotics lab…”

“Buy a salad mix at the grocery store. They come in these handy little bags. $3.97 each.” 

“That’s really all?” Tony asks.

“The salad and yourself,” Laura says firmly. “Dinner’s at seven.”

***

Tony comes at seven with a salad in a bag and a wary look in his eyes. He drinks one beer, eats two helpings of chicken, and stays late to help Cooper build one of those ridiculous Lego sets that require more patience than Laura can muster even on her very best day. Afterward he insists on washing out her roasting pan, and she lets him even though he’s terrible at it and leaves behind long streaks of grease.

“So, uh, your husband is in jail,” Tony says finally, when he’s got nothing left to do and he can’t decently avoid looking at her any longer.

Laura smiles wryly and takes a drink of beer. “Yeah, I noticed.”

“And I kind of, uh -- Well, according to certain perspectives on last week’s events, it might be possible I deserve some blame for him being there,” he says with a sad little half smile. “So, uh, sorry.”

Laura sighs. Of course Tony’s blaming himself. “You remember that time a Norse god hijacked Clint’s mind and made him do a lot of really bad things?” she asks.

Tony narrows his eyes. “What does that have to do with -- Oh.”

“When the news came from Vienna, Clint just looked at me and said, ‘What if that was me?’ And I told him to go help.” She shrugs. “I’m not happy with how it turned out. Obviously. But it had nothing to do with you.”

“So I’m here because…” 

“Well, I _am_ a little starved for adult conversation. I have to lie to all the other grown-ups about where Clint is, you know.” She drains her beer. “But mostly, I was worried about you.”

“You can stop,” Tony says breezily. Well, it’s a good approximation anyway - just not good enough to fool Laura. “I’m fine. Totally fine. Nothing to see here.” He shoots Laura a wary look. “And, honestly, you know, I don’t really deserve that, so --”

“You don’t have to deserve your family, Tony,” she says. “That’s how it works.”

Tony frowns. “I’m not your -- I mean, we’ve only met a couple times. I’m pretty sure the whole family thing takes more than crashing the farmstead once or twice.”

Laura shrugs. “You’re Clint’s family. All of you are. I think that makes us in-laws. If it makes you feel more comfortable, you can be that awkward uncle who comes around on holidays and drinks too much.”

“I really don’t think you want me in your family,” Tony says. His shoulders are all hunched up, and his eyes are darting around the room, plotting an exit strategy.

“We’re pretty flexible about who we accept. Lila adopted an orphaned snake today.” Thinking about Lila’s new pet slithering through the house makes her shudder. Maybe she should stay in a hotel until she’s sure the snake is dead, leave the kids to fend for themselves.

“Your kids are weird. I like that about them,” Tony says, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “The thing is, though, I’m not so good at the whole family business. Maybe you haven’t noticed, but I blow things up a lot. Hit on women when I shouldn’t. Start fires, the literal and metaphorical kind.”

“This house has five rules,” Laura says. “One, if you move something, put it back where you found it. Two, if you get something dirty, clean it. Three, if you break something, either fix it or help replace it. Four, don’t open a door without knocking first, and five, don’t use your outdoor voice unless there’s an emergency. Anyone who can do those things is welcome here, including you.”

Tony’s staring at her like she’d grown an extra head. She gets it. From what Clint has told her -- and from the rather surprising amount of information Tony tends to randomly dump on the internet -- he came from a family where rules were unspoken and expectations shifted, and that made it easy to let people down. The idea that you can belong somewhere just through normal human behavior is probably a little foreign.

“About the breaking things,” Tony says finally. “Sometimes -- a lot of the time, maybe -- I make things worse when I try to fix them.”

Laura gets up from the table and comes to stand next to him. “Okay, how about a rule number six, just for you? If you break something, try the simplest possible solution first, and then work your way up from there.”

Tony’s eyes still look wary, but there’s a hint of a smile ghosting around his lips. “I might need some guidance and examples on that one.”

“That’s easy. The simplest solution is very rarely a robot. It probably doesn’t contain rare earth minerals, and it’s unlikely to require a trip to Wakanda.” She nudges Tony in the ribs with her elbow. “To bring it closer to home, the simplest solution is not to launch the most elaborate prison break known to man. It’s to come over for dinner and keep me company till my husband gets home. Think you can do that?”

Tony manages half a smile at that. Then he says to his phone, “Friday, pick a couple days in the next week or two when I can have dinner with Laura Barton.”

Laura smiles. “Next time, I’ll even let you bring the fancy wine.”


End file.
